Stairs have a particular vibe. There’s something about where they lead to, or what they connect, or just how they appear. Stairs are cool, indeed. We simply love them. So here they are: 8-1 stairways to Heaven from around the world.

Some of them are nature-built, some of them are man-made, but they simply represent a symbol of both nature’s friendly invites, as well as man’s incredible conquest abilities.

#1. Scala (Rainbow Staircase), Wuppertal, Germany

Artist Horst Gläsker took a dull staircase built in between two buildings in the town of Wuppertal and turned it into a rainbow of colors, transforming an eyesore into a bright, energetic spot. He named the 112-step artwork Scala, which stands for “staircase” in Italian, and enhanced it with stencils of German words that refer to human relationship manifestations, such as love, sympathy, and dance.

# 2. Las Pozas, Xilitla, Mexico

Built by non-conformist English poet Edward James in 1962, this is actually a surrealist garden sculpture that took more than two decades to complete and covers 80-plus acres of Mexican jungle. This modern structure, called Stairway to the Sky, it’s actually a winding staircase one can climb up, but it leads nowhere.

# 3. Escadaria Selarón, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

This is a sheer example of Latin vividness. Chilean-born artist Jorge Selarón, who began renovating the destroyed steps in 1990 created the famous steps. Choosing to paint the stairs in the bright colors of blue, green and yellow, his simple task soon turned into his greatest artistic passion. The staircase has 250 steps and is covered in tiles collected from countries around the world. This piece of art runs from Rua Joaquim Silva and Rua Pinto Martins, and covers both the Lapa and Santa Teresa neighborhoods.

# 4. 16th Avenue Tiled Steps, San Francisco, CA

This tile steps project was conceived and made by Irish ceramicist Aileen Barr and local San Francisco artist, Collette Crutcher. Having over 163 steps, the entire creation process took more than two and a half years to complete mostly because it required helpful actions from the local community to raise necessary funds. Their hard work eventually paid off, as the project was unveiled in August 2005. This public masterpiece is located at 16th Avenue and Moraga in the quiet neighborhood of Golden Gate Heights.

# 5. Heaven’s Gate Mountain, Zhangjiajie City, China

Visitors to this mountain in China must first take a cable car that lifts them thousands of feet in the air or hop on an apparently dangerous bus ride that goes along a very narrow mountain road filled with countless twists and turns. Once the base of the gaping hole is reached, there are exactly 999 steps leading up to a temple. The latest touristic addition to the mountain is the “sky walk”, which allows tourists to look down at the massive hole below them through a clear glass floor.

The Traversinertobel Bridge swings more than 200 feet above the valley of Via Mala. Designed by engineer and architect Jürg Conzett along with Rolf Bachofner, the Traversinertobel solved the question of how to connect two gorges with varying elevations. Before the modern staircase, hikers had to cross from one side to the other with a rope bridge that was destroyed during a rockslide. This suspended footbridge spans a distance of 2,214 inches, with a difference in height of 867 inches between the two ends.

# 7. Taihang Mountains, provinces of Shanxi and Henan, China

This spiral staircase is about 3.937 inch high, and was recently installed in an attempt to attract tourists to the beautiful Taihang Mountains. Before making the ascent, visitors are asked to sign forms to ensure they do not have heart or lung problems, and are under age 60. And a slip on the narrow metal ladder can certainly lead to disaster.

# 8-1. Staircase to Nowhere, Winchester Mystery House, San Jose, CA

Let’s finish with the creepiest one of them all, a wooden staircase that also leads nowhere, but due to strange reasons. Haunted by spirits, widow Sarah Winchester apparently built a beautiful Victorian mansion that has a lot of strange elements, but the most curious may be the staircase that dead-ends in the ceiling. Some speculate that Mrs. Winchester chose this baffling design to confuse evil spirits and throw them off her track.